Qualcomm Snapdragon 860 vs MediaTek Dimensity 8050 vs MediaTek Dimensity 7300

Qualcomm Snapdragon 860

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 860 (SM8150-AC) Mobile Platform is a high-end smartphone and tablet SoC that Qualcomm announced in 2021. Compared to the old Snapdragon 855 Plus, the 860 is very similar and adds support for 16 GB RAM and a few camera features.

The SoC integrates a fast ‘Prime Core’ that clocks up to 2.96 GHz (up from 2.84 GHz in the 855) and three further fast ARM Cortex-A76 performance cores, which can reach up to 2.42 GHz. These are complemented by four power-saving ARM Cortex-A55 cores that clock up to a maximum of 1.8 GHz.

The SoC also integrates the X24 LTE modem that Qualcomm promises will deliver up to 2 Gbit/s maximum download speed over LTE Cat.20 and up to 316 Mbit/s upload speeds. The Snapdragon 860 can be configured with the company’s new X50 5G modem too (as an external chip).

The integrated Wi-Fi modem, which is Wi-Fi 6-ready, has 8x8 Sounding and supports up to 802.11 ay Wi-Fi. The Wi-Fi modem can utilise the 60 GHz mmWave band for up to 10 Gbit/s internet speeds.

The Hexagon 690 DSP incorporates a neural processing unit (NPU) with dedicated Tensor-cores that can execute up to 7 trillion operations per second in conjunction with the CPU and GPU. In short, the Snapdragon 860 should be three times faster than the Snapdragon 845 and two times faster than the Kirin 980 SoC.

The Snapdragon 860 also has a Spectra 380 ISP onboard, which was the world’s first part to incorporate a Computer Vision Engine (CV-ISP) that can perform depth calculations in videos at up to 60 FPS. The Snapdragon 860 should deliver real-time portrait modes or be able to detect objects with relatively low power consumption.

The built-in memory controller supports up to 16 GB LPDDR4x RAM (4 x 16-bit). As the SD855 and 855+, the 860 integrates an Adreno 640 graphics card.

Qualcomm will manufacturer the Snapdragon 860 at the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) using a 7 nm FinFET process. 

MediaTek Dimensity 8050

The MediaTek Dimensity 8050 is an ARM-based SoC (System-on-a-Chip) manufactured at TSMC using the 6nm process.  It supports all current mobile standards including dual-SIM 5G (5G SA & NSA, max 4.7 Gbps download and 2.5 Gbps upload). The SoC also supports Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2.

The MediaTek Dimensity 8050 was specially designed for use in Android smartphones and is classified in the upper mid-range in terms of performance.

The CPU part consists of three clusters: a fast performance core, based on the ARM Cortex A78 architecture and clocked at up to 3 GHz. The second cluster consists of three Cortex-A78 cores with up to 2.6 GHz. Four ARM Cortex-A55 cores with up to 2 GHz are installed as a power-saving cluster.

The integrated ARM Mali-G77 MC9 graphics unit can drive displays with a resolution of up to 2,560 x 1,080 and a refresh rate of up to 144 Hz (possibly only with Full HD+).

Technically, the SoC is similar to the older Dimensity 1300.

MediaTek Dimensity 7300

The MediaTek Dimensity 7300 is an ARM-based mid-range SoC for (mostly Android based) smartphones. The integrated CPU is divided into two clusters with four larger ARM Cortex-A78 cores with up to 2.5 GHz clock speed and an efficiency cluster with four ARM Cortex-A55 cores with up to 2 GHz.

In addition to the integrated ARM Mali-G615 MC2 iGPU, the 7300 also offers a MediaTek APU 655 for AI tasks. Furthermore, a 5G multi-mode modem is installed (2G - 5G) with up to 3.27 Gbps download speed. In addition to Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.4 is also supported.

The chip is manufactured using the modern 4nm process and is advertised to consume 25% less power compared to the older Dimensity 7050.